States of ChildhoodHow virtual adulthoodchildren's role play in simulated cities, states, and nationshelped construct a new kind of "sheltered" childhood for American young people. A number of curious communities sprang up across the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centurysimulated cities, states, and nations in which children played the roles of legislators, police officers, bankers, journalists, shopkeepers, and other adults. They performed